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How Did The Great Depression Affect The Economy

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Following World War I, the United States emerged as the world’s largest economic power, and along with this great prosperity came great propensity for great changes in society, which led to the decade known as the Roaring Twenties. During the 1920s, a new form of the American economy emerged which emphasized extremely high rates of consumption. The public began to buy as much as possible. Assisting this system was a concept known as installment buying that allowed people to acquire an expensive commodity, perhaps a new automobile or radio, and pay for it over months and months, in small amounts each time. Along with the increase in prosperity and consumption came a vast increase of popularity of the stock market. Before the 1920s, only the …show more content…

Furthermore, they bought farms from those too poor to own them. As a result of this investment, these methods of production continued to flourish, even if no one could buy them. Americans continued to starve, but not because food did not abound. Even if the Great Depression economically affected different income groups proportionally, the realistic impact told a different story. The top 10% of the US population by income continued to earn the same share of the total national income both before and during the depression. However, this statistic alone ignores the reality of that statement. The wealthy still had wealth, but the lower class went from having little wealth to threadbare none. Essentially, the upper class still invested in means of production that made them wealthy, but very few shared in the wealth. Due to lack of government involvement, a high tariff causing international isolation, and a circular economy that continued to put money in the pockets of those least impacted by the hard times, the Great Depression lasted a decade. Because of its extreme longevity (compared to most severe recessions), the Great Depression had a lasting impact on the United

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In the 1920’s, the economy was booming, and businesses were earning significant profits.

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No matter if a country was considered rich or poor, the Great Depression had devastating effects. The unemployment rate increased dramatically, going from 3% to 25%. For the people who were lucky enough to still be employed during this horrible time, their wages fell 42%. However, the crash of the stock market is not the only thing that caused the Great Depression. In the middle of the 1930’s, a severe drought struck and it ruined much of the agriculture of the United States, which was known as the Dust Bowl.

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In a period known as bull market, the economy was booming and stock market trading increased, the economy flourished. Installment buying allowing Americans to buy more even if they didn’t have all the money. This helped the economy prosper throughout most of the 1920s. An important factor contributing to this economic was the automobile industry. As shown in Document 9, a graph from the Historical Statistics of the United States, the mass production of automobiles led to millions of people across the country buying automobiles.

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Now the rich people couldn’t even buy the luxury things they used to before like a 35,000 boat (Doc. 8) because they now had to precisely manage their businesses so they wouldn’t fall into this bottomless pit. Not many faced this problem though because the rich were scarce in this time period. Only two percent of the US’s population of families was making over ten thousand dollars a year (Doc. 9). All-in-all overproduction was a really big cause of the Great Depression but it didn’t have a biggest negative

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“By 1932, one out of every four workers in the United States was unemployed.” During this time the unemployment rate went above twenty five percent. Compare that to the current unemployment rate of approximately six percent helps to understand the magnitude of this unemployment. The people that were able to keep their job were paid a very small amount of money. This is evident when James E. Faust, a man who lived through the depression said “As a young man, I lived through the Great Depression, when banks failed and so many lost their jobs and homes and went hungry.

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The Great Depression was one of the most devastating economic crises in the history of the United States. It began in 1929 after the stock market crashed, setting off an economic spiral. Lasting for a decade it caused widespread unemployment, poverty, and social unrest. The economic collapse had devastating effects that had impacted everyday American life, including individual families, to the national economy, and even the government. During this period of time the American people faced a range of challenges including, unemployment, homelessness, starvation, and social inequality.

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Could you imagine living in a world with limited electricity, food, water, and other daily necessities? This is the kind of world people had to live in during the Great Depression. The Great Depression was a dark period of time in which the economy collapsed. Many people lost their jobs and money, but the government tried to give hope. To lead off, the Great Depression put millions out of work.

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The Great Depression was a period of an economic disaster that lasted from 1929 to 1939. The effects of the depression varied across the nation and had a significant impact on all the different classes of the society. The following investigation will explore the impacts of Great Depression on the daily lives of middle-class Americans. Middle-class Americans were severely affected by the Depression mostly because they stood in the most convenient place of the societal ladder, they were neither poor nor wealthy. So, when Depression struck, the middle-class almost disappeared from the ladder because the economic crisis was massive and affected their lifestyles drastically.

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In what ways did the Great Depression affect the American people? After a decade of economic prosperity, what seemed like an era that defined the concept of the American dream, quickly came to an end when the stock market on Wall Street collapsed in 1929. The aftermath of the events that occurred on Wall Street would put its heavy mark on the years to follow among the citizens of the United States. Banks closed down, unemployment rose and homelessness increased. It was a widespread national catastrophe that had its impacts on both poor and rich.

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No one can possibly have lived through the Great Depression without being scared by it. No amount of experience since the depression can convince someone who has lived through it that the world is safe economically. Isaac Asimov. In the United States, from 1929 to 1939 they experienced the Great Depression which hugely impacted their economic state. During the Great Depression, the 3 events: the Dust Bowl, the Stock Market Crash, and rampant Deflation were the most devastating factors during this era, worsening the U.S. economy and drastically deteriorating the quality of life for American citizens.

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The majority of people made under 2,000 dollars a year (Document 9) which was considered the bare minimum to live off of, the buy all of the basic essentials. These people didn’t have any money to spend on luxury items and couldn’t buy on credit. During this time, some companies priced their goods at a higher price than the majority of people made in a year, like boats that were priced anywhere from 10,000 dollars to 35,000 dollars (Document 8). With nobody to buy from them, these businesses were left without a profit and began going bankrupt. An average family before the depression with two people working full time jobs only made around twenty dollars a week (Document 7).

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